


This Pre-Conceived Notion of Before

by LokiOfSassgaard



Series: Sex is Boring [4]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-14
Updated: 2011-03-14
Packaged: 2018-05-28 21:29:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6346075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LokiOfSassgaard/pseuds/LokiOfSassgaard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An epiphany is made concerning this relationship-shaped thing between Sherlock and John.</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Pre-Conceived Notion of Before

John didn’t come back to the sitting room after he finished up in the shower. Sherlock listened from his chair as the water stopped and John moved from one room to the other. He fancied that he could hear John in his room, changing into his own pyjamas, but it was difficult to tell. John lived by routine, and Sherlock realised that he could have just had the routine memorised and knew what John would be doing at any given moment.

But that routine had deviated. Usually, John would return back downstairs to watch whatever dreck was on telly that night as Sherlock dozed on the sofa. It was a sickeningly domestic routine, but one which Sherlock had come to enjoy and expect.

John had broken that routine, and Sherlock wasn’t quite certain what to do in its stead. Anything he could think to do either held no appeal, or required John.

John, who was always all too happy to initiate some sort of contact between them; who would sit on the far end of their slightly-too-small sofa, despite Sherlock sprawling on it, simply because he wanted to.

John, who had gone upstairs and apparently made an early night of it without declaring this deviation from the routine. It almost seemed as though he’d rather just avoid Sherlock all together.

Oh.

Embarrassment.

He didn’t even look at Sherlock as he left the shower – asked him to leave, actually, in that round-about way. John never asked Sherlock to leave. He always seemed to want to remain as close as possible, even Before. Before the shift in their relationship had gone from whatever it had originally been to whatever it had become.

What had it become? It had definitely become something, because it was changing Sherlock’s behaviour; changing his reactions to John’s behaviour. Why did he want John to be downstairs so badly? Why did he want to listen to John’s crap telly while he slipped in and out of consciousness in an uncomfortable position on the sofa?

John needed to know that his behaviour was unacceptable. He couldn’t just go to bed two and a half hours early without warning Sherlock of these intentions. He needed to be downstairs where he belonged, keeping the routine.

Sherlock reached for his phone on the desk, taking no time at all to compose his message.

I need you downstairs.  
SH

Six seconds later, he heard John’s phone chime from the kitchen. Damn. What was his phone doing in there? He usually kept it with him in case Sherlock needed something; an easy way to communicate that didn’t involve shouting loud enough to annoy Mrs Turner’s married ones.

John hadn’t expected shouting up to the second floor a possibility. He had planned for Sherlock to follow him to the shower. Had he planned for Sherlock to follow him to his bedroom as well? Initially, perhaps. Before Sherlock had rejected him.

Just as John was rejecting Sherlock.

Was this some sort of revenge? No. John wasn’t so petty. He frequently called Sherlock childish for trying to enact revenge against Mycroft for whatever annoyingly intrusive thing he had most recently done. Previous observation showed John going out of his way to avoid being hypocritical. He made an effort to keep from doing the same things he tried to keep Sherlock from doing.  
Not revenge. A response to the embarrassment? More likely. Didn’t want to look at Sherlock. Afraid Sherlock would still be upset. Probably though Sherlock didn’t want to be near him.

Most likely the correct scenario. John was completely wrong, of course. Most likely correct because John was completely wrong.

Shouting wouldn’t help, then. If John presumed Sherlock to be angry, he would only interpret the shouting as an angry gesture. Wrongly. Sherlock shouted for a variety of reasons, with anger being low on the list. John should have known that. Why didn’t he?

Simple. He did know that, but was being irrational. He reacted without considering all the variables. Typical John.

Don’t ever change.

Sherlock tossed his mobile at the other end of the sofa, considering his options. First option: forego his usual evening nap. The usual nap was only usual when he didn’t have a case on (at which point, the nap happened at the first avai lable opportunity). He could find a case; make up an excuse for breaking the routine.

Unlikely to happen. Any case that he had to actively seek out wouldn’t be worth his time. Anything he could do around the flat would feel like the busy work that it was, just filling the time while his mind buzzed unpleasantly because the transport needed some rest.

Second option: have his nap without John. The sofa didn’t feel right without John on the other end. The room was wrong without John flipping between three different channels. Sherlock couldn’t sleep on the sofa without John for the same reason he hated sleeping in his room. Everything was too static.

Realisation: he only ever slept when he napped on the sofa. He was only ever able to nap when John was around. Close contact with John had become a requirement for sleep to happen. His feet in John’s lap, John absently tracing vague patterns on his feet and ankles until John was ready for bed and Sherlock w as awake, bored, and in requirement of stimulation.

He would need to re-evaluate this pre-conceived notion of Before.

Sherlock needed his few hours of sleep, and he wasn’t going to get it. Not downstairs, anyway. John coming downstairs seemed unlikely. Sherlock would have to go upstairs to him. Would doing so upset John? He liked John to not be upset with him, though by this point, it seemed as though John was already upset with him. Going upstairs likely couldn’t make matters much worse.

Sherlock wasn’t superstitious, but he had a sudden feeling that things could get quite a bit worse. John could kick him out of the bedroom, or worse, declare his intentions to leave. Sherlock couldn’t let that happen.

He also couldn’t bear being alone in this sitting room for much longer. Why was it bothering him so badly? It had never bothered him before.

He’d look into the matter later. He had other, more pressing issues to deal with.

Going up to John’s room was the only option if Sherlock wanted to quiet the incessant buzzing in his head. He just needed his usual somewhere-between-two-and-three hours of sleep and then he could go back to keeping a suitable distance between himself and John. Sighing as though this were all John’s fault (it was, wasn’t it?), Sherlock hauled himself up from the sofa and climbed the stairs to the second floor, careful not to let the stairs squeak beneath his tread. John’s door was closed, but a small sliver of light crept out from beneath it.

Not asleep. Just avoiding Sherlock. Somehow, this was even better. It meant John would be doing something, making small noises to make this whole tedious sleep thing more comfortable and familiar.

Sherlock didn’t bother to knock. He pushed the door open and shrugged out of his dressing gown, letting it fall to the ground as he walked to the far side of the bed.

“Sherlock, what are you doing?” John asked, snappi ng his attention up from his laptop.

Working on his blog, no doubt.

“Sleep,” Sherlock muttered as he crawled under the duvet.

John watched him, making no effort to eject him from the bed. Good. He also didn’t seem to be going anywhere, himself. Even better.

“You do have a bed, you know,” John pointed out. “And a sofa.”

“And you’re not in either of them,” Sherlock pointed out. Duh. Obvious.

John sighed and closed his laptop, setting it gently to the floor before twisting slightly to face Sherlock.

“What are you doing?” he asked. John’s words were becoming clipped. He didn’t want Sherlock in his bed.

Sherlock didn’t want to leave.

The plan was not working the way Sherlock had imagined.

“Trying to sleep,” Sherlock muttered. “You’re not helping.”

“So take one of your pills. That’s what they’re there for.”

The Zolpidem in Sherlock’s bedroom. It didn’t so muc h help him sleep as it had knocked him out, leaving him hazy and unable to focus for the entire day following. He’d taken it once and nearly binned the stuff afterward. He would have done, if not for the certain knowledge that it would somehow come in useful again in the future. He hung onto it just for that reason.

“I reserve the right to refuse any medical treatment which wrecks my brain,” Sherlock growled into his (John’s) pillow.

Another sigh from John. “Yeah, you do,” he agreed. “I just really wish you wouldn’t sometimes.”

“You wouldn’t have to resort to threats of drugging me if you’d just shut up and let me sleep,” Sherlock pointed out. He thought it sounded helpful.

The exasperated noise coming from John seemed to suggest otherwise. “I was not threatening—” He paused for a long moment. “Why do you think you have permission to come in and invade my bed like this?” he asked.

He was getting better at aski ng concise questions with only one answer, even if it did take him a few tries to get there.

“For the same reason you think you have permission to grope me in the shower,” Sherlock said, finding himself more irritated than tired at the moment. “Seems rather pointless keeping two bedrooms anyway. I never sleep in mine; I’m considering just turning it into a lab so Mrs Hudson will stop throwing away my experiments.”

John was quiet for a long while, and Sherlock thought that he had finally won the argument. He felt himself slowly relax; wishing John would lay his hands on him so he could manage to fall asleep.

John didn’t lay his hands on him, though. He started talking again instead.

“So, that wasn’t a one-off then?” he asked. “The other night, I mean?”

“I think it stopped being a one-off about seven months ago,” Sherlock pointed out.

He could hear John trying to work everything out in his head, but couldn’t reall y blame him for being slow on the uptake on this one. After all, Sherlock had only just realised this detail about this whatever-it-was between them himself.

“Right,” John said. “Right, OK. So, we’re still up for tomorrow, then?”

“Fine, whatever,” Sherlock said. “Sleep.”

John reached for his laptop after a moment and restarted everything, pulling up iPlayer to run in the background. Every so often, when he would pause to think of the right way to phrase something for his blog, his hand would hesitantly reach out and rest on Sherlock’s side, tracing light circles with his thumb before going back to typing slowly.


End file.
